Anna Patton
Anna Patton is a versatile clarinetist, singer, composer, and educator driven by musical curiosity. She is the co-founder of Zara Bode’s Little Big Band, in which she plays clarinet and arranges horn parts. She also works with the internationally touring dance band Elixir, which plays American and Celtic fiddle tunes with a horn section, influenced by early jazz, R&B, and classical music. She has recorded albums as a solo artist and with Elixir, and appears on albums by many other artists including Julian Gerstin, Julie Vallimont, and Andrew VanNorstrand.
Anna teaches vocal and instrumental ensemble classes, music theory, and aural skills at workshops all over the US and in her home town of Brattleboro, VT. In 2006, Anna started the Soubrette Jazz Choir at the Vermont Jazz Center, which performs her creative arrangements of historical and contemporary American music.
Daughter of beloved Vermont mandolinist Will Patton, Anna grew up learning a wide repertoire of folk, pop and jazz standards. As a teenager she sang with Village Harmony, with which she toured Bulgaria, where she also studied Balkan clarinet. She majored in ethnomusicology at Marlboro College and in 2015, Anna completed the Masters of Music in New England Conservatory’s Contemporary Improvisation program. With a cohort of students from all over the world and all musical backgrounds, she collaborated on performances and studied with the school’s extraordinary faculty of composers, improvisors, and ethnomusicologists.